First lady Melania ‘hates’ to see families separated
WASHINGTON (AP) — First lady Melania Trump “hates” to see families separated at the border and hopes “both sides of the aisle” can reform the nation’s immigration laws, according to a statement from her office Sunday about the controversy.
Stephanie Grisham, a spokeswoman for Mrs. Trump, said: “She believes we need to be a country that follows all laws, but also a country that governs with heart.” She said Mrs. Trump “hopes both sides of the aisle can finally come together to achieve successful immigration reform.”
While the statement suggested the matter was an issue for Congress, Democratic lawmakers and others have pointed out that no law mandates the separation of children and parents at the border. A new Trump administration policy, which went into effect in May, sought to maximize criminal prosecutions of people caught trying to enter the US illegally. More adults were being jailed as a result, which led to their children being separated from them. A former first lady, Laura Bush, joined the debate, calling the separation policy “cruel” and “immoral” and said “it breaks my heart.” She compared the separation of the children to the internment camps for Japanese-Americans in World War II. “The reason for these separations is a zero-tolerance policy for their parents, who are accused of illegally crossing our borders,” Mrs. Bush said in a column in